University of California, Berkeley, Ph.D.
University of California, Berkeley, M.A.
University of Utah, B.A.

Expertise

Biblical studies and the languages and literatures of the Ancient Near East; biblical and Near Eastern ritual and law

Profile

DAVID WRIGHT, Professor of Bible and Ancient Near East, offers courses on Hebrew Bible; biblical and Near Eastern ritual, law, and history; and Northwest Semitic languages (Aramaic, Ugaritic, Northwest Semitic dialects) as well as courses on comparative Semitic linguistics and Hittite. His research specialties are Near Eastern and biblical ritual and law in comparative perspective. He is author of Inventing God's Law: How the Covenant Code of the Bible Used and Revised the Laws of Hammurabi (Oxford University Press, 2009). Wright is also author of The Disposal of Impurity: Elimination Rites in the Bible and in Hittite and Mesopotamian Literature (Scholars Press, 1987) and Ritual in Narrative: The Dynamics of Feasting, Mourning, and Retaliation Rites in the Ugaritic Tale of Aqhat (Eisenbrauns, 2001). He was also chief editor of Pomegranates and Golden Bells: Studies in Biblical, Jewish and Near Eastern Ritual, Law, and Literature in Honor of Jacob Milgrom (Eisenbrauns, 1995).

Wright, David. Inventing God's Law: How the Covenant Code of the Bible Used and Revised the Laws of Hammurabi (OUP link: http://www.oup.com/us/catalog/general/subject/ReligionTheology/Judaism/?view=usa&ci=9780195304756). Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.